Okay - time for the "Prez" to weigh in...(Good Lord, what hath I begat...)
A little over a year ago, I wrote the following in a trip report after my second trip to Rio:
Quote:
So where does that leave Costa Rica? (You diehard CR fans may want to stop reading at this point). Well, it’s a nice little country with amazing natural beauty, a strong democratic political tradition and sense of social equity, and warm, friendly people. But for mongering - in no way, shape or form can it compare with the richness, scope, and intensity of experience available in Rio. At this point, I see it’s utility limited to the following:
1) As a “Tijuana surrogate†for guys in the southeast U.S. who can jump on a plane and be there in less than three hours for a quick weekender “get your rocks off and leave†type of trip. Even though you can easily fly to CR direct from L.A., with 11 hours total air travel involved, it makes more sense just to jump in a car and head to Tijuana – just as cheap, and with actually a greater number of options available. And if I have four to six nights, I’m going to Medellin, Cartagena, Cali, Panama City – maybe even the DR or Cuba – all not much more difficult to get to, and all reportedly better scenes than CR.
2) For a longer “combo trip†where you can hook up with a favorita and spend some time touring the country – checking out the gorgeous beaches, volcanoes, rain forests, etc., and also get in a little mongering on the side. I see Peru in very much the same vein – with it’s wonderous natural beauty and tourist attractions, I would never do a week-long trip there without checking all that out. But if I’m doing a trip of a week or more strictly to monger, I’m going to Rio – or maybe in the future, Thailand or the Philippines – where the overall experience and bang-for-the-buck more than justifies the additional travel involved.
3) As a “base of operations†for guys who are set up well enough financially that they can live there full-time without working. I still see a huge upside to living in CR, especially in the Central Valley. Wonderful climate, lower housing costs and cost of living (compared to the U.S.), decent enough infrastructure, enough Americans and American-influence so that you won’t feel like a fish out of water, etc. You also get to know the scene and reap more benefits than is possible if just visiting on vacation (discounts, non-pros, etc.), and other destinations in Latin America now become all that much more easily accessible.
And that for me still about sums it up. Granted, it is possible to have a good time in CR. But most of the time, it takes a lot of luck or too much damn work, or a little of both. It's much more of a "hit and miss" type of place than other destinations I've been too - the girls much more about business than going out and having a good time. Rio blows it away for quality of women and venues, service attitudes, you name it. Medellin provides much higher quality women on average with again better service attitudes. Even little Sosua in the Dominican Republic has both better daytime (La Passions) and nightime (Classicos disco) venues than anything in San Jose at present - and at better prices. And all these venues I think benefit from the fact that they haven't yet been flooded by casual, undemanding gringo mongerers from the U.S. - or at least in the case of Rio where U.S. gringos aren't in any way dominant.
In our post-trip recap this time, one of the things PR and I discussed was whether it was mostly us or CR that has changed. Ciao is right to say that I once enjoyed CR a lot - hell, the evidence is all over the board - but I'm not sure now that the scene is really a whole lot different overall than the time of my first trip in November of '04. Even my very first session - a dupla I pulled out of the Del Rey on my first night for a $100/each TLN - was only an equivocal success; the sex fairly hot - but I quickly gave up on the TLN idea when the girls turned on the TV and began raiding the mini-bar at Amon Plaza afterwards (imagine the joy they must have felt at a gringo kicking them out early after paying their full asking price).
Otherwise, it certainly seemed like there were a wider variety of palatable options at the time - there was a great strip club in Kamur; a great cheap MP in Oasis (though it's arguable that Relax has ably filled that niche now), Zona Blue just entering into its prime. And though I don't think the Del Rey/Key Largo has changed much over that period, Sportsmen's was just getting off the ground and certainly didn't provide the sort of selection it does now (though the "Fab Five" hotties were available at now bargain prices).
So I would have to say mostly it's us. You simply reach a point after a while where things get a bit stale - where the simple novelty of having casual sex with a young latina doesn't get you off like it used to unless it's something really special. And as Spanky says, CR is "limiting" in that sense - the venues don't provide the environment to promote the sort of ecstatic, over-the-top mongering experience that seems more possible in other places I've been to. But the opportunities to enjoy the friendships and comraderie developed both here through the board and on the ground (as experienced by many of us this past weekend) in some ways compensates. Enough I suppose, to keep me coming back for more now and then - though certainly with less frequency than before.
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On the other hand, with Spanky's absence, CR sucks a little less. 
